Thank You Martha Raddatz

via Atlantic Monthly [pic via YouTube]

THIS IS a classic exchange, with Martha Raddatz slamming down the notion that some women can’t pull their own weight and then some.

Host Martha Raddatz interrupted him, saying she’d seen female combat medics rescue 6’4″ Marines. “That’s fine,” Will responded, noting 152 women had died in the post-9/11 wars. “But there are certain anatomical facts about upper body strength and stamina.” Panelist Steve Inskeep said, “there are surely individual women who could pick you or I up wounded and carry us off a battlefield.” Raddatz concluded, “It probably would not be me, but there are lots of them.” Raddatz is selling herself short. Using the standard military technique for carrying people off the battlefield, she could have carried Will off the set quite easily. [The Atlantic Monthly]

Since Joe Scarborough is so sincerely concerned that the Pentagon will play politics with the women in combat and possibly put American lives in danger, someone needs to get this to him stat.

Martha Raddatz seems to finally be getting her due. She’s one of the most mild mannered and competent people in the business.

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Any nurse worth her/his salt knows how to use body mechanics to move a patient much larger than her / himself. It is all about making the weight work for them. Upper body strength is a red herring. Small slight men have been pulling their big bruiser comrades out of danger for decades. But let’s not let facts get in the way of a troglodyte freak out about icky girls doing he-man type stuff.

I think the response there would be something along the lines of: Yes, we’re sure they thought about it, but those evil libruls made them do it anyway.

In reality, anyone who is reasonably strong can carry someone much larger than he is in the manner shown in that photo, at least over even ground. Women who are physically and otherwise able to do the job should be able to do it. I’ll bet the folks who are objecting on these grounds don’t object too much when similarly-sized men are assigned to the infantry.